


Nothing Personal

by Black_Betty



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, M/M, Mal/Robert past relationship, Violence, brief description of past child abuse, mafia au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-13
Updated: 2012-08-13
Packaged: 2017-11-12 01:12:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/484965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Black_Betty/pseuds/Black_Betty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Robert Fischer is a dead man.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nothing Personal

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the inception reverse bang, and it almost killed me. Seriously. Talk about writer's block--much love to the mods of the reverse bang who put up with my many problems, and my whining, and ESPECIALLY to ladderax who put up with the same, and somehow managed to whip me up a lightning fast beta--so much love to you my dear!! Also, soooo many thanks to juliecrowbar whose art is exceptional, without whom this fic would not exist. Very literally. She also gets props for the title. And I guess I should thank Sneaqui who is always so lovely to me, and who was only 1 of 2 people who I think actually read this on LJ hahaha--the other person has vanished into the ether, but I send my thanks out to you as well!
> 
> Check out the original art prompt here: http://i.imgur.com/uzXq5.jpg
> 
> Too gorgeous for words!!

  
  


Robert Fischer is a dead man.

Everyone knows it, including Robert Fischer. It is a truth he had realized the very moment his father took his last rattling breath, nearly drowned out by the stuttering grind of machinery, all of the plastic tubes and borrowed blood and nurses in starched white uniforms not quite enough to keep him alive a moment longer.

Robert had been happy to see him go. Maybe that made him a bad person, but he had always known he was a bad person, had known it even as a child wishing death upon his father as Maurice brought his belt down again and again on the bare flesh of his backside, until the buckle broke the skin.

And it is good that Robert isn’t a good person, because he knows now he is going to have a fight on his hands, and wishing death upon those who stand against him isn’t going to be nearly enough.

The problem isn’t killing people. He has been in the [business](http://black-betty-26.livejournal.com/6293.html) long enough to understand it as a function of his [job](http://black-betty-26.livejournal.com/6293.html), the same as business meetings and false smiles, like shaking hands and breaking fingers. He had stood in his father’s shadow, in the corners of dark basements and rotting cellars, watching silently as men were brought to their knees, gleefully sidestepping splatters of brain matter and pools of blood, waiting for his turn in the low swinging lamps, waiting for his orders to be followed without question, as his father’s were.

His problem is that now, in the wake of his father’s death, he has been set adrift. Robert hadn’t really ever done anything to win the favour of his father’s [men](http://black-betty-26.livejournal.com/6293.html). He hadn’t ever thought he needed to, had arrogantly assumed that they would turn their allegiance to him as easily as they would the son of the king ascending the throne of his ancestors.

He discovered how very wrong he was the very night his father died. It hadn’t been more than ten minutes since he watched the old man take his last breath, since he felt the weight off his chest, since he thanked a god he didn’t believe in that the old bastard was finally nothing but cold flesh. Robert had stepped outside for a victory cigarette and dropped his lighter in the snow. As he bent to pick it up, the concrete wall behind his head exploded in a shower of stone and dust.

Undignified, terrified, he had scrambled through the slush and muck of the road until he got to his car, a ricochet of bullets bouncing off the pavement behind him, shattering the rear window of his Cabriolet. Ducking down, awkward and sick and so panicked he could barely get the car into gear, he had pressed the gas petal down with his hands and hoped that he wasn’t going to drive himself into a lamppost.

Somehow, he had made it home in one piece. From home he had escaped to a safe house, where he is still holed up, stuck in darkness with only the radio for comfort. Where he has avoided the outside world since that night, the night his father died.

That was four days ago.

Robert Fischer is not a brave man. He is a cruel man, yes. A clever man. A handsome man. But he is not brave. Not on his own, with only his cigarettes and guns for company. He wants to find those men who thought they could end Robert Fischer on a street corner, nameless and alone. He wants them to die. He wants their deaths to be so horrible, so grotesque that no one will dare cross him again. He wants his power to be absolute, and he wants to rule this city absolutely.

But he doesn’t want to get his hands dirty. He needs an ally.  And that very night, four days after the death of his father, a price on his head and a target on his back, Robert Fischer is about to find one.

***

When he finally ventures out, it is the day they put his father in the ground. He doesn’t go to his father’s funeral. Nothing like a wide-open space to welcome a spray of bullets, or a hand reached out in condolence to disguise a knife.

No, Robert goes to The Morrow, that fine establishment, for the old bastard’s wake. A well attended Irish tradition, even for someone as universally disliked and feared as Maurice Fischer, and one where, hopefully, he might find some friends willing to talk, and bargain.

He hopes that with some luck he might be able to sleep a little better, might be able to ease his fingers off the trigger of the ever-present gun under his pillow.

The Morrow is down a flight of stairs and through a set of brass doors. It is dark inside, low golden light and red velvet cushions and heavy drapes, polished mahogany bar and round stools, a world that sucked up light and refused to let it go.

Currently it is packed full, the murmur of many voices rising and falling like a wave, underscoring the smooth rat-a-tat of the snare drum and the sprinkle of ivory keys pouring off the stage at the far end of the bar.

Robert makes his way through the crowd, aware of the eyes on him from every corner, though no one’s head turns his way. The weight of his gun tucked under his arm is a comfort, as is the knife strapped to his ankle, and though his fingers twitch for a weapon, he reveals nothing, only tugs the black leather at his wrist to feel the pull of his glove along his fingers.

He sinks onto a bar stool and holds up two fingers, grateful when Arthur, the eternally sour but effortlessly prompt bartender slides a glass of bourbon his way.

“On the house,” Arthur says, in that low, smooth voice of his, as mellow as the band on stage but infinitely more toneless. Robert tries a smile on, but Arthur only nods at him and turns away, the same as always. Robert is beginning to think he’ll never talk the man into his bed. A shame, really. He’s always wondered what is underneath those superbly pressed trousers.

As he reaches in his pocket for his cigarette case, musing over the pull of Arthur’s waistcoat as he reaches up for another bottle off the top shelf, he is suddenly aware of a presence behind him. Feels that horrible nervous ache all along his spine that speaks of someone standing too close to him, close enough that Robert imagines he can feel body heat radiating against his back.

There is a puff of air at his ear, and then a man’s voice,

“Shouldn’t leave your back to the room like this. Anyone could sneak up behind you.”

Robert pauses, and then continues to pull out his case, feels the man go rigid behind him. He is expecting a weapon then, and is ready for it. A man of action. Possibly a man of violence. Robert clicks open the case and pulls out a cigarette, places it between his lips in one smooth, practiced movement. There is a shift of weight from behind him, and then an arm reaches around him, a hand holding out a stainless steel lighter, flame lit. A body follows the arm around, leans fluidly up against the bar and as Robert leans forward to light the end of his cigarette, he takes a moment to look the man over.

Handsome is the first thing that crosses his mind. Dangerous is the second. The stranger holds his body loose, lounges in a way that seems relaxed, but on closer inspection is more defensive, deceptive, prepared to strike at any moment. His suit is cut larger than his body, emphasizing the breadth of his shoulders, concealing the narrowness of his waist. Effectively hiding any number of weapons across his chest.

The brim of his hat is pulled down low, casting his face in shadows, but Robert gets the impression of clear eyes narrowed in concentration, a full mouth surrounded by day-old stubble. He is, at first glance, some kind of rough low-life, the kind of man who would lurk in back alleys and stick a knife in between your ribs for the change in your pockets. But Robert has spent his entire life amidst every colour of criminal there is, and all his well-earned instincts are screaming at him that this man’s roughness is as calculated and crafted as Robert’s own kind smile.

He takes a long drag off his cigarette and breathes out slowly, blowing a cloud of smoke into the stranger’s face. The man doesn’t flinch, or cough, only smiles with a slight curl of his lips.

“Do you have a…recommendation as to where I should sit, then?” Robert taps his cigarette against the bar, knocking ash onto the hardwood in a way that makes Arthur glare at him. The stranger just smiles at him for a moment longer, and then turns and wanders away, the dense crowd seeming to part easily before him.

Robert Fischer does not follow just anyone, and he doesn’t take orders from someone else, but there is something about this man, something strange and intriguing, and so he pushes himself away from the bar, cigarette hanging limply from his lips, fingers curled around his glass and trails in the stranger’s wake, drawn inexplicably and unavoidably forward.

When he finds him again, he is standing next to a darkly lit booth, velvet curtains drawn back in front of the semi-circled bench and table. Robert is sure that all the booths had been occupied when he came in, but this one is suspiciously vacant. He doesn’t miss that it is the closest booth to the back door, or that it allows him a view of the entire bar, while also enabling him to keep his back to the wall.

A man of strategy, then. A man of escape routes.

The stranger is becoming more appealing by the moment, and not just because of the way his trousers cling to his thighs as he leans one shoulder against the wall.

He gestures with one hand, waving Robert into the booth ahead of him, and sliding in after him once he is settled. They sit in silence, music from the stage louder now that they are closer, wafting over them like a warm blanket, like something sweet baked in an oven. Robert surveys the crowd and pretends he doesn’t feel the stranger look at only him.

When the music recedes for a moment, fleeing the room, leaving behind a smattering of applause and the unintelligible mutter of numerous conversations. Robert speaks without looking at man sprawled next to him, lounging like a wild thing in a three-piece suit, his eyes boring holes into the side of Robert’s face,

“I didn’t catch your name.”

From the corner of his eye, he sees the man’s mouth curl into a smirk again, and Robert feels the familiar curl of anger ignite in his chest. This man had better not be laughing at him. Robert had killed people for less, had cut smiles into their faces that would last long after they stopped laughing. If there was one thing he could not abide, it was being made a fool of.

The man’s voice, when he answers, is devoid of mockery, and maybe that is what extinguishes the rage, or maybe it is the way his tone speaks of something more, something deeper, layers of unspoken meaning tucked into each word.

“You never asked for it, Mr. Fischer.” So he knows who Robert is. Interesting.

“I’m asking for it now.” He looks at the man then, shifting his eyes toward him in a way that usually unsettles people. This man only meets his gaze dead on, unflinching, staring him down under the low brim of his hat before answering,

“It’s Eames.”

He has never heard of him, but that is no surprise. Robert makes it his business to know everyone in town, and this man, with his accent, his affected mystery, is obviously new. He nods, and takes another drag of his cigarette, swallowing a mouthful of bourbon to wash down the smoke. It makes the liquor taste like it’s on fire, and something in his bones settles, in a way he hasn’t felt settled since his father died.

“And tell me, Eames, what exactly do you want from me?” And this is the real question, isn’t it. If the man wants to work for him, Robert isn’t sure he can trust him, new and untried as he is. If he wants money, a loan, Robert isn’t in the position to break his kneecaps if he reneges. Is he here to bargain with him? To kill him? To lure him into the service of some new kingpin on the up swing? If he is, Robert is definitely, and resolutely, not interested. Really, the only thing Robert wants from this man is a good hard fuck, and he somehow doubts his luck is that good. He doubts he has any luck left at all, after using it all up on the street four nights ago, bullets whizzing by so close they split the ends of his hair.

His answer surprises him.

“I want to save your life, Mr. Fischer.”

For a moment, all of his words, all of his clever responses dry up in his mouth. To hide his surprise, he swallows another mouthful of bourbon and when the sharp tang has mellowed on his tongue he is able to ask, calm and collected,

“Who says I need saving?”

What Eames would have said to that is lost as suddenly, the mood in the room shifts, and all eyes turned towards the stage. With a rustle of piano keys, a flourish of saxophone, a parting of red curtains, Mal appears in all her splendor, the purple of her dress lush and luminous in the footlights. In her presence everything seems to diminish, fade away, and as she steps up to the microphone, a hush descends over the room as pale faces turns toward her like sunflowers to the sun. For those who come to the Morrow, the bar is their church, and Mal the voice of God, in front of whom they supplicate themselves in benediction.

She speaks before she sings, incomprehensible words in French though Robert knows she’s lived for years in New York, speaks English better then some of his father’s goons, and swears with more artistry than the sailors who drifting in and out of the Morrow when the tide rolls in. But the French adds to her mystique, her aura of mystery, and Robert allows it with the same ease with which he allows Mal all her eccentricities.

But then, he has never been able to deny her anything.

He knows, through his limited understanding of the language, that she had said something about his father, and so what followed was all the more bittersweet, the straining, plaintive tones of that sad, familiar tune,

_Pack up all my care and woe,_

_Here I go,_

_Singing low,_

_Bye, Bye, Blackbird._

He can’t stop his lip from curling in disgust, and tries to hide it behind his glass. The old bastard didn’t deserve one ounce of sympathy or mourning from this crowd of vipers, and he certainly didn’t deserve Mal, her red lips parsing words of sorrow, her long white fingers clasped around the microphone.

From the corner of his eye, he can see Eames watching him, and he spares a moment to be surprised. It isn’t often anyone has eyes for someone other than Mal when she gets up on stage. He tries to school his expression into something indecipherable, but he gets the feeling that this man, as impenetrable and hard to read as he is himself, somehow knows all of Robert’s secrets with one glance.

When Mal’s song ends, she drifts off the stage, the ambient music and conversation drift back in like someone had turned the dial of a radio, voices and unimposing tunes nattering away again in the wake of her lingering, sorrowful moment. Robert isn’t surprised when she makes her way to his side, turning down all offers of hands in dance, and lifted glasses for toasts, not stopping until she makes it to his table and slides in next to him.

“Robert,” is all she says, and he takes her hand and kisses her knuckles, as always.

“He didn’t deserve that,” he says to her, more honest than he’d been in days, in weeks. But he is always honest with Mal, and he likes to think she is always honest with him in turn.

They had known each other as children, their fathers being associates in some private, undisclosed way. Mal had been a wild thing behind closed doors, and she had taught him how to drink, how to smoke, and how to kiss all by the age of eleven. When they were in public, especially in the presence of their fathers, she had been nothing but an angel, while Robert had struggled more to create defined lines between his new animal side and the proper son his father expected him to be. It led to more than one round with his father’s belt, and afterwards Mal had cooed at him, and stroked his hair, and then opened his window so they could climb out and tear down more of the world.

She had disappeared when they were teenagers, after the death of her father. Mal, suddenly unfettered and let loose on the unsuspecting public. He had heard something about a marriage, and maybe children, but when Mal turned up in his life again after years, she was without a ring on her finger or dark haired children in tow. She was just Mal, only more beautiful, and with more secrets than ever before.

“Who is your friend, Robert?” She asks instead of addressing his remark about his father. She never did follow the direct vein of a conversation, preferring to weave words and subject in her own way, until all were at the mercy of her attention and inquiry.

Eames tips his hat in her direction, and introduces himself, and for a moment they silently look each other over. What the consensus is, Robert has no idea, but Mal says nothing more to Eames, only turns to Robert to ask him,

“Will you come and see me tonight? I thought we might drink in honor of Maurice, just the two of us.” She doesn’t look at Eames, and Robert knows her well enough to know she means for Robert to come without him, just as he knows that ‘in honor’ of his father, really means in celebration of his death. Mal always did know him best.

He nods and Mal smiles at him, leans in to brush her mouth against his briefly before sliding effortlessly out of the booth and wandering away without a backwards glance.

“Don’t,” Eames says, interrupting the warm buzz of his thoughts that always seemed to follow a kiss from Mal. Robert turns to him again, and sees he is leaning slightly forward, an edge in his posture that had not previously existed. When he raises a questioning eyebrow, Eames frowns and says,

“Don’t go there tonight.”

 Robert smirks and throws back the last of his drink.

“Mal is my oldest friend. I trust her.” Eames’ full mouth pulls into a grin, and the gleam in his eye is more unsettling than the obvious strength of his arms, or the fact that his jacket is hiding a small arsenal of weapons.

“If you trust that bird, you need my help more than you think.”

And that is when Robert decides he has had enough. Enough with the games, and twisted words, and roundabout conversations. Enough of this handsome, dangerous, unimportant man who wants something from him, but won’t say what. Enough of this room full of people who want to see him bleed, who want his head on a platter. Enough. He slams his empty glass down on the table and leans forward, keeping his voice low, but sharp enough to cut through the din of the bar so Eames will be sure to hear him.

“Listen to me, you thug. I don’t know you. I don’t want to know you. I don’t care what you think or why. And I definitely don’t ‘need’ you—I’ve never needed anyone, and I don’t intend to start with you.” He shoves his way out of the booth with significantly less grace than Mal had done, and leans in again to spit out,

“I can take care of myself,” before turning on his heel and striding out of the bar. Unsettled, restless, paranoid as always, this time when all eyes follow him, each one feels like a finger on a trigger, ready to pull.

***

That night he goes to see Mal.

Mal, as cold and beautiful as a marble statue won’t provide him with an ounce of comfort, but she will allow him some measure of a safe haven, and for one night he will be able to drink, and relax, and forget.

That night Mal proves to him that no one in his life could be trusted. Not even with a night of relative safety. Not even with a glass of bourbon.

He remembers the sharp tang of the alcohol, different from the glass Arthur had poured him earlier that day. He remembers the room growing hazy and blurred along the edges. He remembers Mal’s face, the coolness of her familiar smile, as she plucked the glass from his limp fingers before he could dump its contents on her carpet, remembers her perfect red mouth moving as she murmured something in French, the words the last thing he can recall before the walls tilted sideways and faded to black.

When he wakes again, the first thing he thinks of, to his bleak amusement, is how Eames had been right. in one all encompassing moment he imagines the smirk on that beautiful full mouth, and he hates him. And then he wonders if he will ever get to see him again.

He is still at the kitchen table in Mal’s loft apartment, still sitting slumped in his chair, and his cigarette is still smoldering in the ash tray in front of him. He hadn’t been out for long then—and yet, long enough for a stranger to appear before him, as though conjured from the hazy air of the room.

He feels a sharp tug at his wrists and he realized that his hands are bound behind him. There is a lingering caress across his palm before he hears the click of Mal’s heels as she steps away from him.

“I’m sorry Robert,” she said.

“No. You’re not,” Robert answers, and when he lolls his head backwards he sees in her upside-down expression that she is not, her mercurial smile unapologetic.

“Don’t blame Mrs. Cobb, Mr. Fischer. She has only done what I have paid her to do. As a loyal employee should.” Robert rolls his head back to the man in front of him. Tall, foreign—Japanese, Robert guessed, based on the cut of his features, the thick cadence of his accent—handsome and aware of it, aware of his looks, of his wealth, of the power he assumed over the room merely by sitting in it. He is unknown to Robert, but one look at him tells him that he is a player. A force to be reckoned with.

“Mrs. Cobb? Mal—you get married while you were away?” There is the familiar click of a gun being cocked, and sure enough, he feels the press of metal against his temple. He rolls his eyes upwards looking up at the girl he thought he knew, the very last person he thought he could trust.

“Guess my invitation got lost in the mail,” he mutters, and turns his attention back to the man across from him, who is watching him with a mask of apathy.

“Our intention is not to hurt you, Mr. Fischer. We only wish to discuss business.”

He tone is smooth and level, and undercut with danger, like a coiled snake hiding its fangs. Robert swallows as unobtrusively as he can, but he sees Mal smirk from the corner of his eye. That bitch.

“If it’s just business, what’s with the gun?” The man smiles, slow and amused, and Robert wants to tear his teeth out.

“You’re a hard man to track down, Mr. Fischer. Lucky our friend Mal here could persuade you to come out of hiding.”

“Friend?” Robert bites out, sharp and bitter. The barrel of the gun caresses a slow line down his jaw in response and he jerks his head away. Suddenly, he feels exhausted. He has experienced the final betrayal. There is only himself to blame, and he only has himself for comfort and company now. In a way, it is a relief.

The man leans forward, the edges of his shirt gaping open to reveal a chest decorated with scrawling tattoos, drawing Robert’s eyes despite himself.

“My name is Saito,” he says, smiling wider when Robert’s eyes snap to his face, and his expression looks kind, and welcoming, but Robert has seen that smile before. Had seen it on his own father’s face when he made a deal with a man, right before he stuck a bullet in his brain.

“I want to run your business.”

And there it is: the deal—next up, the bullet.

“I think you want to run me  _out_  of business.” Saito sits back and folds his hands neatly in front of himself, but Mal digs the end of her gun into the soft underside of his jaw.

“Now now, Robert,” she murmurs close to his ear, “Be nice.”

“You are a straightforward young man, Mr. Fischer. While some might find that rude,” Mal emphasizes this point by digging in a little deeper with the gun, twisting Robert’s head back so that it rests uncomfortably against the back of his chair, “I find it refreshing. Let’s not ‘play games’ as you say here.”

Saito smiles then, and says, easy and almost kind,

“Either you hand all of your business over to me, your contacts, your men, any pull and influence your father might have left you. Or I kill you, here at this table.”

And there it is, painted in clean lines, lit up like the electric sign above The Morrow, like Mal standing in front of a microphone, illuminated by the hot lights. Robert’s death in glorious Technicolor.

He can’t help himself. He laughs. He laughs and laughs, unable to stop even when Mal tangles her long fingers into his hair and holds him painfully still against his chair back, even when Saito frowns at him and shares a knowing look with Mal over Robert’s head. He laughs until it burns in his throat, until his eyes water and tears run in hot streams down his cheeks, he laughs and laughs, until he is on the edge of hysteria. This moron. This complete fool.

It’s all over. At least he had got to have one drink before he went.

“Mr. Fischer—“

“Robert, stop it—“

They try, but still he laughs, until he can finally choke out,

“There’s nothing. There’s nothing—good luck to you Mr. Saito, good fucking luck…you try to build on my name and they’ll put a bullet in you, just like they tried to put one in me.”

For the first time since he met the man, though it had only been a short while, Saito looks less than serene. He looks distinctly ruffled, in fact. Robert takes a great deal of pleasure in it, and it makes Saito’s frown crease deeper into his face, as he watches Robert’s smile bloom like a diseased flower across his face.

“Then I’ll kill you now,” Saito says, his voice betraying none of the frustration Robert can see scrawled across his face, “and save everyone else the trouble.”

He shoots a look at Mal, and Robert feels her step away, feels her fingers ease out of his hair. He cranes his neck to look at her, and sees her smile, remorseless, and wonders if she had always been this cruel, even while they were children, or if something had happened to her to make her this way.

Suddenly the laughter is gone, the bravado, and in its place is a tightness of his chest, a quickening of his heartbeat as his organs squeeze together and try to press up into his throat. He realizes then that this is it, and instead of that earlier relief, there is a fluttering panic that grows and grows until he thinks he might choke on it.

He doesn’t want to die. He has always loved his own life even when he felt no love for anything else, and here he is, unable to save even that.

“Wait, Mr. Saito—“

“Too late for that now Robert.” He looks at Mal instead and she only raises the gun a little higher,

“Goodbye Robert. I’ll sing another song for you tomorrow.”

He tries to breathe, but there is no air. Tries to speak; prepares pretty words to use, to beg (and he didn’t think he would ever beg, isn’t that interesting, how far we fall at the very end), but there is nothing.

Nothing. Just like he said.

He looks at Saito again, feels his eyes widen and water, tries to scrape together some dignity, but there is nothing. Nothing.

Saito smiles,

“Goodbye, Mr. Fischer.”

He closes his eyes—

 

A gunshot.

 

And another.

 

And another. Suddenly the air explodes with the sound of bullets as they dig their way into wood, shatter through glass, bounce off metal and copper, a world full of sudden chaos and sound. When Robert’s eyes fly open again, it is to bright colour and movement, Mal leaping across the table to tackle Saito to the ground, blood on her dress, or maybe spilled wine from the table. The table is turned over, broken and full of holes, holes from the bullets that still tear through the air, and the sound is deafening.

Distantly he thinks maybe he should move, should get out of the way, but miraculously the danger seems to whip past him, destroying everything but his own body which remains intact, and whole.

It isn’t until a hand grips him by the back of his jacket and hauls him to his feet, cuts him loose, that he snaps back into reality. He thinks for a moment it is the hand of god, ripping him from the mortal coil, but no, Robert knows he’d always been a bastard, a cold son of a bitch like his father, and besides, this hand belongs to someone far better than a god he’d never known.

“Move,” is all Eames says to him as he shoves him towards the door, directing another shower of bullets from his Tommy gun towards Saito and Mal who crouch behind the sofa, tufts of pillow batting bursting into the air like clumps of snow.

And then they are outside, and the night air hits him like a brick wall, fresh and clean and full of rain. Eames hauls him over to a car and shoves him inside, climbing in after him and throwing the car into gear, and he grins at him from beneath the brim of his hat, his crooked teeth gleaming white in the flash of streetlights overhead, and he says,

“Told you--you need me.”

And Robert doesn’t have anything to say to that, can only roll down his window and breathe, and try not to vomit on the upholstery, as ugly and worn as it is.

***

Eames takes him somewhere rundown, and non-descript, and Robert feels like a different person, sliding into a new skin, a new life, and his nerves feel jangled, and his hands are shaking, and he thinks his flesh might melt away, leaving him with only rattling bones.

So he does the only thing he can do, the only thing he can think of—really, the only thing he wanted, had wanted since he first laid eyes on the man. He grips Eames by the lapels of his jacket and shoves him down onto the awful olive green armchair under the sputtering lamp, and holds him there when he struggles, and crushes their mouths together when he starts to shout.

Eames stops protesting, and moves just as quickly, gripping Robert by the hips and hauling him down into his lap, their bodies connecting painfully, their kiss as much a fight as it is an embrace, and Robert relishes it, feels it ignite him from the inside, and he feels gloriously, deliriously  _alive_.

He knocks the hat from Eames’ head, running his fingers through his hair, damp with sweat at the temples, and when he pulls back, he is pleased by the changeable eyes, the straight nose, the cut of Eames’ jaw and cheeks. He grips Eames’ face between his hands, biting hard at his lower lip, muffling his curse, licking at the blood as it wells up and trails down his chin.

Eames thrusts him back again, pulls at Robert’s jacket which protests, pulling at the seams, before he shoves it down his arms. Finished with his jacket, he pulls Robert’s tie loose, ripping the buttons of his vest apart, and Robert lets him, let his wide capable hands strip him of his funeral suit, leaving him bare, his skin cold and sensitive in the air, his body arching into Eames’ arms as Eames pulls him close again, his mouth latching onto Robert’s nipple and sucking hard.

He cries out, a jolt of pure pleasure shooting from his stomach down into his cock. Eames chuckles, a low rolling sound that pisses him off as much as it turns him on, and lifts Robert easily in his arms, clutching him close as he stands and tosses him onto the low mattress in the center of the room.

Robert can’t help but laugh breathlessly at the suddenness of the movement, unbearably turned on, and unable to turn away as Eames strips off his own vest, his shirt, revealing miles of rolling muscle and tanned skin, a battlefield of scars and faded tattoos, and Robert wants to devour every inch of him.

“Trousers,” he says, and Eames grins at him, stripping effortlessly and watching Robert do the same, crawling over him when he’s bare and pressing their bodies close, gripping him tight enough to bruise, and grinding hard against him, kissing him again and again until Robert can’t breathe, and it’s so different than before, when he couldn’t find air and his life was flickering like a candle’s flame, about to extinguish—now the world is bright and delicious and he is electrified.

When Eames slicks him up and thrusts home, throwing Robert’s legs over his broad shoulders and gripping him under his back for better leverage, Robert goes blissfully blank. Distantly he can hear Eames, the low crawl of his voice whispering filthy things. He hears him say,

“You need me, you need this, don’t you, look at you—begging for it—“ And Robert’s mind is suddenly ignited, He swings his legs down and around Eames’ waist, clutching on and rolling him so swiftly that Eames can only tumble over, can only gaze up at him with wide eyes. Robert kneels astride his waist, one hand pinning his wrist to the bed, the other clutched tight around Eames’ throat.

“I’m not begging for anything,” he says, his face looming over Eames, and he lowers himself to steal a kiss from his open mouth, bending over to breathe the next words into his ear, tightening the grip his has on his wrist, his neck, his waist so he’s truly trapped, so he realizes he’s caught, even with all his muscles, his guns, his crackling wit and sharp mind.

“I’m taking it. Understand?”

Eames breathes out one shuddering breath and nods. Robert lowers himself back down onto his cock, moving languorously, slowly, drawing them back into a rhythm that makes them Eames groan and roll his hips up to meet him.

“You’re mine now—right?” Eames bites his bottom lip, still cut and bleeding and nods as Robert takes him deeper, moves a little faster until they’re both panting, the sweat building between them.

‘Yes,’ Robert thinks, watching Eames throw his head back, his eyes squeezed shut, and Robert releases his wrist, his throat, grabbing his face instead and pulling him close, swallowing each whine and moan from his mouth, each breathless gasp, taking them all for himself. When Eames chokes and makes a delicious grunt as he comes, his cock twitching deep inside Robert’s body, Robert kisses him and speaks against his mouth.

“You’re mine, and together, we’re going to take back this city.”

And when Eames nods, and grabs his cock, Robert smiles, and comes.

 

And realizes he has never felt more alive.

 

END.


End file.
